Dominant display keeps Czech challenge alive…just!
The Czech Republic cruised to an easy 2-0 victory in Prague on Saturday to keep their chance of qualifying for the 2010 World Cup just about alive. The result also ended any qualification hopes for their opponants Poland.
The result, which was sealed by goals from Tomas Necid and Jaroslav Plasil, means that Ivan Hasek’s men now go into Wednesday’s crucial game with Northern Ireland needing a win. However their fate is out of their own hands as Slovenia’s win over group leaders Slovakia means they are now 2 points clear of the Czech’s with just one game each to play. Unfortunately for the Czech Republic, Slovenia’s game in hand is against Group Three whipping boys San Marino, who have only ever won one game, and drawn four in their entire history.
Marek Jankulovski came close the breaking the deadlock
The hosts were on top from the very first whistle and played with the urgency you’d expect from a team in their position. However for all their dominance in the first half they simply couldn’t find a breakthrough. Marek Jankulovski and Plasil had a couple of chances and the latter was also brought down in the area, but his penalty claim was waved away by referee Claus Bo Larsen.
It was clear that despite all their possession, the Czech’s needed something to give them an extra spark. The spark came in the form of 20 year old CSKA Moscow starlet Tomas Necid. The young striker, who has attracted the interest of Arsenal in the past, didn’t take long to mark his arrival, just five minutes in fact as he latched onto Tomas Rosicky’s through ball and poked it past Wojciech Kowalewski in the Poland net.
The introduction of Tomas Necid was a master stroke
From now on there was only going to be one winner and despite Kamil Grosicky giving Hasek and his men a scare, the Poles looked fairly lost for ideas and it was only a matter of time before the Czech Republic wrapped up the victory.
The win was sealed in the 72nd minute when man of the match Jaroslav Plasil doubled the Czech’s lead and consigned Poland to failure in their attempts to be present in South Africa next Summer.
Man of the match Jaroslav Plasil sealed the victory with 18 minutes to go
Coach Ivan Hasek was a man of few words at the final whistle, perhaps because he had one eye on the Slovenia match, however he did say: “We played a good match, especially in the second half,”.
Despite the good performance and result, the people of the Czech Republic could be forgiven for also having one eye on the other crucial game taking place in Group Three between group leaders Slovakia and fellow World Cup hopefuls Slovenia. The match finished in the worst possible manner for the Czech’s as Slovenia managed to record a 2-0 victory to put them two points clear of the chasing pack. As mentioned above, Slovenia aren’t expected to face much, if any, difficulty overcoming their final opponents, so elimination for Ivan Hasek and his men looks on the cards.
Of course it would be very easy to claim that the constant chopping and changing of managers (they’ve had three since the campaign begun) is to blame for the under-par showing, but let’s not forget that the new managers have had much less to play with. After all, the retirement of Pavel Nedved and Jan Koller have left two massive holes to fill (in Koller’s case, quite literally!) plus Tomas Rosicky has missed almost the entire campaign through injury, and his assist proved he can change a game.
The Czech’s will be back.
